Discussion of China–Vietnam competition tends to focus on the South China Sea. But disputes there are managed through cross-party dialogue and committees that work through friction in a way that does not disturb the broader bilateral relationship. A less analysed theatre lies in Cambodia, where the Hon Khoai transport project in Vietnam’s south could help Hanoi retain leverage over a neighbour increasingly courted by Beijing.
Since August 2025, construction has been underway on the Ca Mau–Hon Khoai bridge, an 18-kilometre crossing linking Vietnam’s Ca Mau province to Hon Khoai Island, the southernmost point of Vietnam. The bridge will anchor Ca Mau to a US$4 billion dual-use seaport and transport corridor connecting the Mekong Delta to global shipping routes in the Gulf of Thailand.
Former Vietnamese prime minister Pham Minh Chinh claimed the project is part of Vietnam’s economic development strategy in the Mekong Delta. Ca Mau is one of Vietnam’s poorest regions, with the bridge–port complex justified as an overdue development that will provide better connectivity, logistics jobs and investment that has long bypassed the Delta.
Another way to understand the project is as part of Hanoi’s ASEAN-centred strategy in mainland Southeast Asia — a reflection of how Vietnam views its regional role and a counter to China’s growing presence on its southwestern flank. Vietnam has long seen itself as a frontier state — a power at the edge of a larger order, buffering and extending that order’s norms into its near abroad.
